


Severed Solace

by orphan_account



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Angst, Body Horror, Comedy, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Crack and Angst, Danny's Severed Head X Valerie, Dark, Decapitation, F/M, Funny, Gray Ghost, Head Hunter, Humor, I Can't Believe I Wrote This, I think I'm just gonna abandon this lol, Romance, actually
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-29
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-25 18:17:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20030215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: An encounter with the GIW changes Danny forever, rendering him vitally injured. With no one else to pick up the pieces, Valerie determines that she'll lead Danny down the road to recovery and regain what the GIW stole from him. Lowkey crack-fic. TW for body horror. Slow updates.





	1. leave this star-crossed world behind

Basically, the Guys In White sucked at their jobs. It was only supposed to be a retrieval mission - weaken the ghost, capture the ghost, detain the ghost, and then bring the ghost back to headquarters for experimentation. But due to a stifling lack of competence, things didn't go exactly as planned. They had cornered Phantom in an alley, backed it up against the wall of the Nasty Burger. It's neon eyes were darting between the four agents that had it trapped. The stench of its ectoplasm tainted the air from where it was bleeding out of its side.

And then, Agent X4 - _the dumbass intern _\- pulled out the prototype machete. Agents Q1 and E2 regarded him with skepticism but allowed him to proceed as his saw fit. Just hours earlier, he had been whining about getting 'his chance' to prove himself. Might as well let the newbie wear himself out while they could take all the credit, right?

"We've got you now, ghost," Agent X4 spat. Phantom flinched but seemed to strengthen underneath the man's scrutiny.

"You sure about that? One on four is a little unfair guys, don't you think?" It leaned its head back against the grimy restaurant, chuckling nervously. "C'mon, shouldn't we settle this equally?"

"_Silence_," Agent X4 hissed. He pressed the machete against the specimen's neck.

It regarded the blade below his head and rolled its eyes, "A machete? You know that a knife can't really do anything when it comes to intangibility."

Agent X4 grinned, pressing the machete tighter against its throat, "I'm warning you, _ghost_."

"_Good one_, yeah."

They'd been trailing him all day, but Danny still had a little bit of energy left. Focusing on that tiny spark within his core, he turned intangible. They had him backed up against a wall, but if he could phase into the Nasty Burger… in their panic, he might be able to buy enough time to change back to human.

He propelled himself backward, getting a glimpse of the bottom of a gum-covered booth. But that sight was stolen from him when two pairs of hands gripped his legs and pulled him back into the alley. How had they touched him when he was intangible-?

Right, they had new Anti-Intangibility gloves. They had the same schematics as his dad's ghost gauntlets but were more compact. _Just his lucky day_.

Danny fought against the agents' pull, trying to kick them off, but they had a solid grip on him. They really _had_ captured him, he couldn't even slip into the Nasty Burger.

"Good thinking, J3-"

"He's still fighting, pull harder-"

"Let go-!" Danny frantically tried to find enough power for an ectoblast, but he was all burnt out. _This wasn't happening._

The fourth agent joined the two that were pulling on his feet. The additional force overwhelmed him and he fell forward like a rag doll, directly into Agent X4's machete.

…

White hot pain grazed his throat, and he could feel as the blade pierced through his flesh, tearing and snapping vital parts of his throat. Danny was used to pain (of bruises and bur_ns and electrocutions and slices-_), but this pain was… disorienting. He could feel his head separate from his shoulders, leaving only a numb impression that something was _wrong_. Of course, he knew that what had happened was very wrong but… _what was it again_?

…

White boots. They ignored his head, moving closer to examine something a few feet away. _What… is… this perspective? _Hot pain, liquid seeping out of his neck. Was his neck open? He should probably close it if that's the case….

"_-decapitated the specimen-_"

"_-hell were you doing-_"

_Ow_. Why did those goons have to talk so damn _loud_? Were the Dicks In White still looking for him? What a fucking pain. _Invisibility it is then since I can't do much else._

"_-you three carry its body into the van. I'll get its head …... where's it's goddamn he-"_

Before Danny passed out, he heard the agent command his underlings to search for his head. Unable to find it, they drove away in the van. _Good, stay the hell away from me. Let me sleep._

* * *

Valerie usually welcomed the task of taking the trash out behind the Nasty Burger. She was desperate for even a few seconds out of this stupid grease trap, even if it meant she had to lug gross bags of food scraps to a dumpster for some fresh air. When she took out the trash today, however, she was met with about four retreating GIW agents loading a black bag into one of their signature white vans.

_Totally not suspicious at all._

They had already made it to the next traffic light by the time she disposed of the trash in the dumpster. Honestly, she was a bit curious but decided not to dwell on it much. She'd drive herself crazy with theories if she thought too hard about it.

Not wanting to go directly back to her job, Valerie figured she could at least use the GIW as an excuse why taking out the trash took so long. She slid down against the side of the Nasty Burger, pulled her knees to her chest, and let out a stress-relieving breath. _This week had been hard, she needed a break._

She unconsciously let her hand rest on the ground beside her and recoiled when she met something wet. She looked at where she had just laid her hand and saw nothing on the ground but the usual grime. Bewildered, Valerie examined her hand and saw - _ectoplasm_. The green, slimy substance inexplicably stained her hands. Where had it come from? It didn't look like there was anything in the alley, so how was there ectoplasm of all things here?

Wait.

It didn't _look _like there was anything here. But if there was a ghost….

With a certain degree of caution, Valerie slowly started waving her hand around the area where she had felt the ectoplasm on the ground. It wasn't the brightest idea she had, but she figured if the ghost was bleeding ectoplasm, it was most likely wounded from the GIW.

_There_. Her hand grasped a tuft of icy cold hair.

"Show yourself," she demanded. "I know you're here."

After a moment or two, the ghost made a strangled choking sound but remained invisible. _Fine, if that's how you want to play this…._

"Hey," she softened her tone, "I won't hurt you. They're gone now. The GIW, right?"

"Mmph kay," the ghost responded. Well, that response was _a little _more coherent.

"You can turn visible again. You don't have to strain yourself."

She didn't know why she was reassuring the ghost of these things. It only felt natural, to offer sympathy to something injured. Perhaps that was another one of her flaws, but oh well.

"'Em visible?" and the ghost shimmered into view. Once her mind recounted the horror that she was seeing, she had to stifle a scream. It was _Phantom_, but only his head. His severed head was bleeding ectoplasm out onto the alley and he looked delirious, unaware of what was happening.

"Ph - Phantom?" she gasped. "What did they do to you?"

"I dunno," his eyes were half-lidded at this point. "-urt."

"Phantom, you have to stay with me," Valerie flicked his face, attempting to keep him awake. It was clear he was on the verge of passing out. She didn't know why she was helping her enemy, but she knew that _this_ was wrong. The Guys In White had really fucked up big time.

"Nur, sleep," he mumbled, finally closing his eyes.

Valerie waited for a moment, waiting for any indication that he was still awake, but found none. That was, until a flash of white light enveloped Phantom's face, creating a single halo around him. It broke into two beams of light and Valerie blinked many times to convince herself she wasn't dreaming. But - but this didn't….

The decapitated head of Phantom morphed into Danny Fenton. With one movement of light, her enemy transformed into her ex-boyfriend… with a grisly mangled stump for a neck. The ectoplasm spilling out of Phantom's wound darkened into _warm, _human blood and Valerie almost threw up on the spot.

There was still no way… oh, _Danny._

She yearned with worry. If this wasn't just some illusion that meant that… Danny was like Dani, a half-ghost. Oh. _Danny and Dani._ That was sort of obvious. Anyway, Danny was half-ghost and the GIW had decapitated him (and probably taken his body). And he was still alive, but maybe not for long. Assuming that his parents didn't know about his duality, Valerie was the only one who could possibly save Danny from bleeding out.

"Don't worry," she whispered, carefully lifting his head from the ground. Holding him securely, she pressed her lips to his, reassuringly. _Soothingly._ "I'll fix this. I'll save you, Danny. _I swear_."


	2. left a strange impression in my head

The most alarming thing when Danny regained consciousness was that he couldn't feel anything. He couldn't feel his body, it was almost like the nerves just _weren't there_. From what he could barely tell, it also seemed like he was paralyzed, so maybe he had been drugged and the drug was making him numb? It wouldn't be the first time, unfortunately. Danny had been on the receiving end of Skulker's darts much more than he liked to admit.

When he opened his eyes, all he could see was white. It took him a moment to realize that he was looking at a ceiling, thankfully he hadn't gone blind or anything. But the fact that he was indoors changed things; it that meant that he hadn't been captured by one of his ghostly enemies, a human had taken him.

What had he been doing before he passed out? Danny wracked his thoughts for any semblance of explanation and found little. He'd been patrolling… and then the GIW had shown up? The… GIW….

Oh Ancients, the GIW must've caught him and drugged him. _Shit_.

"Danny?" a soft voice implored. She was somewhere in front of him. "Are you… awake?"

Well, that definitely didn't sound like the GIW. He looked around frantically but since he couldn't move, all he could see was the ceiling.

"Wh - who's there?" he asked. "Where'd you bring me?"

"It's, uh, Valerie," she answered. "You're in my room."

Valerie. But which Valerie? The enemy or the friend? She had called him Danny instead of Phantom and had brought him to her room, so from that context alone he could figure out that she had found Fenton. He'd probably detransformed to get away from the GIW and she had probably found him wounded. So this was the good Valerie, the one that didn't try to kill him all the time. _Thank Clockwork_.

"Do you know what happened?" Danny asked her. If Valerie had been the one to find Fenton, that didn't explain why he was paralyzed.

"I… think," she wavered. "You're not going to take this well, though. It was the GIW. They really… _got you_."

Now he was doubting if he was Fenton. If she was talking about the GIW doing something to him….

"Try me," he suggested. Faking confidence in lieu of panic was becoming a talent at this point. "I've been through a lot."

He could hear her choke for a moment. He wondered what that meant. "I'm so sorry Danny… Danny, they _decapitated_ you."

Mentally, he tried to pull on his body. Command himself to move, _anything_ \- and nothing happened. _That couldn't be right._ He was just confused, she must be too. He laughed, "I'm sorry? What?"

"This isn't _funny_," she hissed. He still couldn't see her. He was also wondering what she had done to him to make him unable to move. "They - they cut off your head. I think I saw them take your body. I don't know how… how you're still alive." She lowered her voice to a whisper, "If you were even alive in the first place."

This was getting awfully frustrating. He still didn't even know who he was right now: Fenton or Phantom. If he knew that, then he might be able to figure out what Valerie was talking about.

"Val," he said questioningly, "what do you mean if I was alive?"

She huffed in annoyance. "Danny, just…" something moved in his peripheral vision. For a moment, he could see Valerie looming over him - and then warm hands wrapped around his face. The next thing he knew, he was moving upward and _everything was disorienting_. He wasn't used to moving around like this; from what he could tell he was being carried. He could see Valerie's room, but it wasn't from a perspective he'd ever seen before, it was like he was two feet shorter than normal.

Valerie shifted her grip on his face (_how was she carrying his face?_) and opened the door to her bathroom. She slipped inside the room and stopped in front of the mirror.

When he looked in the mirror he expected to see himself (as one tends to expect in a mirror) but instead… he was met with the sight of Valerie's body cradling... cradling his head. _Only his head._ He was Fenton and his neck was just a stump, heavily and thoroughly bandaged, peppered with spots of red and green.

Where had his body… how had… how was he _breathing_? No, fuck that, how _was_ he alive?_ No no no nonono_. This was wrong, this wasn't right. This was some sort of fever nightmare. A hallucination. He couldn't actually be-

As he started hyperventilating (_he didn't have lungs_), Valerie turned him away from the mirror, sensing his panic. She carefully carried him back to her bedroom, sat on the bed, and rocked him soothingly in her arms. She positioned him so he could look up at her. He appreciated her efforts, but he was still _very_ freaking out.

"You're okay," she tried, weakly.

"I'm a _head_," Danny realized._ Ancients, I'm only a head what the actual_ fuck - "How is that 'okay'?"

She pursed her lips, "Well, you're still… alive? Existing?" her voice cracked.

_Wait_, Danny realized, _does she know my secret too? She has to if she bandaged up my severed fucking head. Clockwork no no no, could this situation actually get any_ worse?

"I don't even know if I'm _that_," Danny protested, feeling tears slowly stream down his face. "Why are you acting like this is okay? Besides, you have to know I'm Phantom at this point…."

Admitting it felt dangerous, but it was true. There's no way she couldn't already know.

She looked at him sadly, moving her hand to wipe away some of his stray tears. "I don't care that you're Phantom, Danny. You - you're... like Danielle. You're good, and you've been trying and doing good. I was just blinded - by revenge. And what happened to you, this, I never wanted anything like _this_ to happen to you. Goddamnit, I never wanted anything like…" she trailed off, "this."

"I-" he didn't know how to respond. He was still freaking out over the first atomic bomb that he was decapitated. But at least Valerie didn't hate him still? At least that's what it sounded like, he couldn't really be sure.

Valerie caught the look in his eye and continued, "This is scary for me, Danny," she confessed, "and I know it has to be_ downright terrifying_ for you. But… the GIW took your body, and I'm trying to convince myself that I can get it back. No, I will get it back. So yeah, everything _will_ be okay once I do that for you. That's why I'm acting like everything will be fine because I know it will be."

His voice was hoarse. He was still crying, but Valerie's words worked some sort of calming magic over him. Instantly, he felt just a little bit better, even though he was still reeling over the severity of everything.

"Thank you," he whispered. "_Thank you so much, Val_."

"This is the least I can do," she reassured him. A tear ran down her own face, falling onto Danny's. "...I really care about you."

"I know,_ I do too_."


	3. flown too far from the floor this time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! I'm just gonna abandon this work since it started out as a Discord joke and I don't really feel dedicated to it. Hope you enjoyed it though!

"Alright," he faced her nervously, "you _will_ catch me if I fall, right?"

Valerie sighed, "For the fifth time, _yes_. And you've already accomplished it before in human form. You're only going to fall if you doubt yourself."

"I'm the epitome of doubt," Danny remarked.

Valerie snorted, "What, did your sister teach you that word?"

Danny stuck out his tongue, "Now you're the one that's doubting me. You could say that…" he seemed to hesitate as he cracked a grin, "_I'm all brains_."

For a moment, Valerie frowned at his cheap pun, and Danny swore if he had a stomach it would've probably just dropped - but then she leaned forward on her bed (where they were both sitting, laying?) and tapped him on the nose. "I can't believe you're already making jokes about this."

He blew air on his nose, trying to repel Valerie's finger. "Well, dark humor helps me cope."

"I see…" she said, pretending to be serious. "It's a wonder that I didn't figure out that you were Phantom based on your awful puns alone."

"Shut up, you use puns too sometimes," Danny argued.

"Only when they're appropriate. I don't think this is really a funny scenario, but I suppose your joke kind of did lighten the room…" she pondered.

"See," Danny said. She got the impression that if he still had a body he'd be crossing his arms. "I know what I'm doing. Maybe... I just think a-_head_."

She covered her mouth to stop herself from laughing. "_Stooopp_. You're supposed to be practicing. You're stalling on purpose, I'm not that dense."

"Ugh, _fine_," Danny groaned. "I was trying not to make it awkward," he muttered. "That, and I'm probably going to fall-"

"Just go ahead and transform, ghost boy," Valerie was finally getting impatient.

"'A-_head_' you say?" he teased.

She flushed, "Daniel Fenton, I swear I'll-!"

"I know, I know," he interrupted. "I'll do it. Just let me focus…."

Danny closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths (despite not having lungs), focusing on the coldness within him. It was difficult to imagine where his core was since usually he could feel it across from his heart, but now without his body, it was just an abstract sensation. He could still transform, he just couldn't rely on his usual physical guidelines.

"_Going ghost_," he whispered to himself, hoping that his old verbal crutch could help him trigger the change.

Behind his eyelids, he could see a bright light and a familiar tingling sensation, but other than that he didn't feel as he normally did when he transformed. Still just… _numb_.

When he opened his eyes, Valerie was gaping at him. He flustered a bit under her perplexed gaze, unsure of how he should act. He knew that his transformation was… _flashy_ for lack of a better word. But Valerie had already seen him change before, not to mention that only his head had changed in opposition to his entire body.

"You alright?" he tested the waters.

She shook herself out of her stupor. The bed rocked for a moment and Danny was afraid that the motion would push him off balance. "Yeah, yeah I'm fine. I just didn't… _seeing_ it is…."

"-different than just knowing about it?" he suggested. Tucker had said something like that in the beginning too.

"Sorta. And… your bandages…?"

His bandages were wrapped around the stump of his neck. Physically, he couldn't see them. "What about them?" he asked.

"They're black now. They changed with you," Valerie pointed out.

"Oh." He tried to look down, but all he could see was the tip of his nose. "Since this is the inverse of my human half, I guess they also inverted. My uh - suit is also an inverted version of the suit I had my accident in."

He still hadn't told her much about how he became Phantom. He kept it vague: that he got electrocuted in his parents' lab and became half-ghost. He left a lot of details out on purpose. How the electricity tore at his flesh and how he screamed until his vocal cords were ribbons. How Sam and Tucker were there panicking with him, their immediate horror after seeing his ghost side. How he woke up and didn't feel _right_ for days and weeks because he wasn't quite human anymore. How he'll never be human again….

Calling it 'his accident' was simpler.

Valerie nodded, "That kind of makes sense."

No, it doesn't. He knew that she was just saying that for his sake. And he appreciated her efforts.

"So will I have to throw you into the air to get you to use your powers this time?" she asked wryly. "Or can you do it on your own?"

Danny narrowed his eyes, which momentarily burned a brighter shade of green. "I was _about_ to do it."

"Then stop procrastinating!"

"Alright, _alright_," he sighed. "Sheesh, gimme a second to catch my breath after transforming."

He'd managed to float in his human form for about ten minutes before he overexerted himself and fell. Now it was time to try to do it in his ghost form. Defying gravity was always easier as Phantom, but he didn't know if he had enough energy in his reserves to maintain ghost form and levitate. He knew that if he did run out of power, Valerie would catch him, but that didn't mean he wasn't still anxious.

Focusing on that same abstract source he'd used to transform, he envisioned that gravity didn't exist. The world wasn't a 2D plane anymore, he existed in a sphere of space, and he could move anywhere he wanted. He had it within him to take flight, he just needed to unlock that mindset again….

He felt the pressure below his neck disappear, and suddenly he was a foot above Valerie's bed. She was watching him carefully, arms by her side, ready to reach out for him at any moment. And he knew, with Val watching his back (pft, what back? - you're a _head_, genius), that she would never let him fall. He could trust her with everything he had.

"I knew you could do it," she pointed out.

He snorted, "Smartass."

And in that moment, gravity really _didn't_ exist for him.


End file.
